


Different Hats

by an_sceal



Category: Smokey and the Bandit (1977)
Genre: Fred the Bassett Hound, M/M, The Slash of Incredible Wrongness, written in 2005
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-25
Updated: 2014-06-25
Packaged: 2018-02-06 04:47:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1844857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/an_sceal/pseuds/an_sceal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A well-rounded man can find himself wearing a lot of different hats in life.  Snowman just wants Bandit to take his off for once.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Different Hats

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback: Welcome!  
> Stabbing your own eyes out after reading it: Optional
> 
> I blame my friend Alex for this. He was talking about fandoms one might be ashamed of, and my mind just went....HERE. Also, thanks to marigot and beingothrwrldly for the quick and dirty (So, SO dirty...) beta.
> 
> (Originally written and posted on 03/03/05. Text has not been altered/edited from original posting.)

  
_“Too ugly.”  
“Come back with different songs, son.”_  
  
So his career in Nashville was over before it started, and except for a few honky tonk tips, he didn’t have a cent to take back to Waynette.  
  
He’d been trying to hitch for a few hours, guitar case in one hand and duffle bag over his shoulder.  When he finally made tracks into the gravel lot of the truck stop he didn’t think he’d be leaving in a rig, but he was sure glad to be off his feet when the opportunity presented itself.    
  
They talked music, they swapped near misses and close calls, tall tales about sex and booze and cars.  Truth was, he kind of figured by the look of him that half of what Bo was selling was cooked up on the spot, but the other half…well, his mama told him when he was a mess of knees and elbows that it never hurt to let a man tell you a lie, so long as you were smart enough to see the truth in it.    
  
There was truth in a lot of what Bo said, and it turned out, truth in the sticker slapped on his dashboard.  _“Ass, Grass, or Cash”_ and Cledus didn’t ride for free.  He might’ve gone to Nashville to sing, but it turned out he could have gotten further giving head.  Mama had also said his mouth would get him into trouble one day.    
  
Out in the night with occasional headlights flashing into the cab of the truck, Cledus studied Bo, and started writing a song in his head.  Half-truths and legend made for better songs than heartbreak anyway, and when his fingers itched for a pen to write down the words, he stilled them against his jeans.    
  
Bo looked over at him and smiled, tipping his hat down for just a second.    
  


* * *

  
  
Waynette had been more interested in marrying a country star than a trucker, but she settled for him anyway when they thought he’d knocked her up.  Bo came to the wedding, pulling up outside the hall just shy of on time and sitting in the back, like he was just waiting to escape.  Cledus didn’t blame him.    
  
Two months later, it all turned out wrong anyway.  Waynette wasn’t pregnant, wasn’t thrilled with the trailer they’d rented, wasn’t too damn happy that he’d gotten his license and hit the road a week after their honeymoon to the Gulf Coast.    
  
It was long nights, collect calls and shitty food, fucking and fights when he was home.  Snowman came through it alright, found Bo in a stop one night and remembered to call him Bandit in front of everyone.  Hell, a few miles down the road, he called him Bandit alone, but he still couldn’t get him to take his hat off.    
  


* * *

  
  
“That there is the ugliest damn dog I ever saw.”  Bandit moved the pup back towards his mama, ignoring the crying and the fuss as the rest of the litter tried to keep him away from her teats.    
  
“He ain’t so bad.  Looks like my uncle Fred.”  Snowman polished off his beer, looking across the parking lot at his rig and figuring up the time he had left.    
  
“Waynette’s gone back to her daddy again.  Says I ain’t ever gonna give her the life she wants, and she ain’t gonna see her kids grow up with no shoes.”  Cledus didn’t get angry, but it was easy enough to get drunk.  He could make time tomorrow, maybe, if he slept a few hours now.  “They all got shoes.  I don’t know their names, but they all got shoes and clothes and they sure as hell ain’t all mine.”  
  
Bandit looked him over and nodded towards the truck.  
  
“You want her back?  Buy her something.  Promise her something.  I ever tell you about the time-“  
  
“You told me already.  Hell, you’re half the reason I’m in this.”  Bandit gave him that smile, that same tip of his hat, and then he took it off and ambled back towards the lot, whistling the song Cledus had written about him years ago, before he’d known that even the parts that were true were bullshit.  
  
What point was there in arguing?  He followed Bandit to the truck, and they made sure they were pulled to the back of the lot.  In the morning he woke up to a nose pressed against his cheek, but puppy breath had never been one of Bo’s problems, and he’d never peed on Snowman’s boots either.  
  


* * *

  
  
The thing was, beat up as he was, he’d been in on it this time.  He’d been more than the balladeer in the aftermath, the pushover won with the story of hot pursuit and glory.  So when he saw Frog smile at Bandit, he figured somewhere along the road she’d gotten her fingers in his hair, but it only made him laugh.  He passed it off, but Bandit caught his eye in the mirror and grinned at him full force, and he knew that they were still in it together.  
  
The thing was, Frog might have him for now, and Waynette might really be gone, and his kids might remember him as the fat old man who sent them $20 bills on their birthdays, but for now he was Snowman, and by god, that meant something for awhile.    
  
Maybe he’d get a hat.


End file.
